


Moving Pictures

by Tangerine



Category: Dead Zone
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-09-06
Updated: 2005-09-06
Packaged: 2017-10-21 04:24:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,854
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/220868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tangerine/pseuds/Tangerine





	Moving Pictures

It was a little pathetic that Tuesday Night Movie With Bruce was the social highlight of his week. It was like high school all over again, except there would be no making out with Sarah at the end of it, or in the middle of it, or before the movie even started.

There was just Bruce, beer and popcorn.

These days, all things considered, it was an ideal life.

The thing about Tuesday Night Movie With Bruce was that it was, at its very heart, uncomplicated. Johnny could wear his old tee-shirts with the holes in the armpits, and his grubbiest, most comfortable sweatpants, which were thin with age and love. He didn’t even have to shave. He didn’t even have to bathe. Bruce just didn’t give a shit.

Johnny tossed a bag of popcorn in the microwave, punched in a couple numbers then paused before hitting start. A vision of burning popcorn hit him square in the nostrils. Three minutes was too much, he decided, and typed in two minutes. Another vision, this time of a bowl full of kernels, and Bruce choking, and Johnny pounding him helplessly on the back. “Okay,” he said, glaring at his microwave. “Two minutes, thirty seconds.”

Still not enough. No Bruce choking, but Bruce would complain, toss a handful of kernels at him and scratch his left eye, which meant an embarrassing patch and bad pirate jokes.

“Two minutes, forty seconds,” he bartered.

Burnt. Again.

“Okay. Two minutes, thirty-five seconds.”

He waited a moment until the coast was clear then proceeded to perfectly pop his corn. He was well into a bottle of beer (to wash away the stress of dire snack foods) when Bruce let himself in, a box of donuts and a tub of Neapolitan ice cream propped up one-handed on his head, Johnny’s mail clenched between his teeth, and his key stuck in the door.

Johnny didn’t have to be a psychic to know this wasn’t going to end well.

“Wait,” he said, hurrying over to Bruce, tossing the mail onto the nearest flat surface and scooping the donuts and ice cream out of Bruce’s hand. His elbow bumped the door, and he added, “and forget about the key. You’re just going to break it off, and fuck, Bruce…”

Bruce looked down at the broken key. “Listen, man, one of these days you’re going to be wrong, and I was hoping that was it. I’m sure this alarm system of yours is enough to protect us from your admirers. And hey,” Bruce held up a DVD that he had been hiding beneath his arm, “I brought an oldie but a goodie and totally new to you – Star Wars.”

Johnny rolled his eyes. “I’ve seen Star Wars, Bruce. I was awake in 1977.”

“Ah, but not 1999. Allow me to ruin all of your good memories.”

“I also know how to use the Internet.”

“Fuck off,” Bruce said sweetly, tossing the DVD case at him. It wasn’t a rental.

Johnny got a flash of something, but it was too brief and too dark to make much sense of it, just that the overwhelming sense of Bruce lingered after the image faded. He squinted at him, but Bruce was already stuffing a donut in his face and chattering about ice-cold beer.

Bruce didn’t seem to be in any immediate danger. Johnny had averted any popcorn-related injuries, and the vision hadn’t felt unpleasant. He’d been having them long enough that he could tell the difference. So Johnny decided to just forget it and grab another beer.

“You make the best damn popcorn, man,” Bruce said as Johnny collapsed onto the couch, a beer in either hand. It would save him the hassle of getting up and slamming his shin on the coffee table, which was what he was going to do if he did. The beer had told him so.

“Do you ever think it’s sad that this is the pinnacle of our social lives?”

“Speak for yourself,” Bruce said dismissively, picking through the popcorn, humming admiringly at each new piece he popped into his mouth. Johnny thought about revealing the secret, but decided to keep two minutes, thirty-five seconds to himself, especially when Bruce nonchalantly continued with, “I’m not a hermit, and I sometimes get laid.”

“Hello, psychic, you liar.”

“Hello, fuck you, you jerk.”

Johnny valiantly resisted pulling a JJ and sticking his tongue out at him. He was a grown man, after all, and it wasn’t like Bruce wasn’t right. So maybe he didn’t get out a lot, and maybe sex was insanely complicated, but he did have dinner with Sarah and Walt and JJ a couple times a week. Okay, once a week, during what he liked to call Thursday Night Dinner With The Bannermans. Depending on his mood, he squeezed the word ‘pity’ in there.

Five minutes into the movie, and Johnny already knew that the next two hours were going to be agony. So many terrible things had happened while he was in a coma, and this was just the icing on the cake. He took another swig of beer and reached for some popcorn.

The vision hit him hard this time, Bruce more obvious now, standing at the window of what Johnny recognised to be Bruce’s bedroom. Sparse and simple, a bed and a desk and clothes casually draped over boxes he had never unpacked, even years later. An unmade bed, and Bruce at his own window, naked and sweaty and breathing like he’d just had …

“What did you see?” Bruce asked suspiciously.

Aware he was blushing, Johnny muttered, “nothing,” and hoped that was the end of it.

“Uh huh,” Bruce said, obviously holding the belief that Johnny was full of absolute crap. Johnny took a deep swallow of beer, letting the chill soothe the heat of his skin. Bruce had recently gotten laid. As in this weekend, when Johnny had tried calling Bruce more than once, and had left a dozen messages, and Bruce had never called him back, and …

Another vision, clearer now, of Bruce at his window then turning around, grinning, and holy shit, that was a guy in his bed. If the flat chest hadn’t given it away, the penis would have, and the way the guy was stroking it, saying, “c’mon, man, you ain’t that old yet …”

Johnny blinked.

“Fuck me. My best friend’s just gotta be psychic, huh?”

Johnny blinked again.

“The guy’s name is Tony,” Bruce said.

Johnny swallowed thickly, finishing off his second beer and reaching for the third, which Bruce had now, holding it out to him. Closing his eyes, Johnny waved it away and rolled his head back onto the couch. “I had no idea,” he said, “that you even … with men …”

Bruce snorted, and Johnny opened his eyes, looking over at him. He didn’t know what Bruce was thinking, and couldn’t guess until Bruce said, “I know you missed most of the gay pride movement in the nineties, but I know you’re not an ignorant dickhead either.”

“No, no, it’s not that. I’m just … surprised. Is he …?”

“Friend from college.”

“And you …?”

“Yeah. What else is college for?”

“Oh, jeez, I don’t know. Learning?”

“Nerd,” Bruce said dismissively, laughing. “But I forget who I’m talking to. Sarah had you by the balls, man, and let me tell you, you missed out. College is all about fucking. And drinking. And drugs. And, okay, maybe studying, but only under the influence.”

Johnny laughed. “I can’t believe someone gave you a degree.”

“Me neither.”

They chuckled all the way to a semi-uncomfortable silence, and Johnny tried to pay attention to this happy-childhood-memory destroying movie. He stayed away from the popcorn, even though it was the best batch he’d ever made, but the donuts looked safe.

Bruce must have picked through every single one of them, because the visions came like hammer blows with each donut he touched. Tony and Bruce, kissing. Tony and Bruce, fucking. Bruce sucking Tony off; Tony jerking Bruce off. An entire weekend of sex, and Bruce really did have a life, and Johnny really didn’t. Johnny closed his eyes again.

“Sorry,” Bruce said. “I couldn’t decide which one I wanted.”

“It’s fine,” Johnny mumbled, and fuck if he wasn’t hard from all of that.

The movie continued, and so did his erection, and Johnny really did think he was cursed. His life had taken so many bizarre turns, leading him here, to this: getting off on his best friend’s sex life, hard as a rock because the guy licking Bruce’s cock was grinning at him.

Fucking visions.

Driven to desperation, Johnny grabbed the beer Bruce had taunted him with earlier, chugging it for a few blissful seconds of freedom before another vision crossed his eyes. Different this time, though. It was his living room, and the credits were rolling, and Bruce was kissing him or he was kissing Bruce or something, and it was hot, and …

“Shit,” he said.

Bruce looked honestly alarmed. “Am I going to die?”

“No, we’re just. You know what? Forget it. I’ve already changed the future. Get out of my house,” he added with as much raw viciousness as he could manage, which was a surprisingly large amount. He was tired of always knowing, and never knowing anything.

“Are you going to die?”

“Just go home, Bruce,” Johnny said weakly. “This movie sucks anyway.”

“Man, there’s only, like, six minutes left.”

“You’re going to die in six minutes,” Johnny said gravely, tipping back his beer and emptying it with a series of harsh, desperate swallows. When he looked back at Bruce, Bruce was still there, humming thoughtfully, like he was beginning to figure it all out.

Bruce was good like that.

“Are we going to do it?” Bruce asked, finally, chuckling a little.

“I don’t know, but we’re going to kiss. If you don’t leave,” Johnny added shakily.

“Do you want me to leave? Because I don’t mind. You’re a good-looking guy, Johnny, and if you told me that this wouldn’t fuck up our friendship, I’d do it, no problems.” Bruce sounded casual, but Johnny knew him well enough to understand that Bruce was offering something he didn’t give out easily. Bruce had slept with a lot of women, but men …

Men were different, and Johnny was about as different as they came.

If Johnny reached out his hand, there would be no turning back. He knew, in his gut, that it would fuck up nothing. He and Bruce, they were uncomplicated together. They liked the same movies, and laughed at each other’s jokes, and Bruce had never given him a headache. A hard-on, yes, but Bruce was good like that, too, apparently. A good friend.

The credits started rolling, and Bruce leaned forward, and Johnny met him halfway, and the vision came swiftly and briefly, leaving him feeling happy and relaxed. Bruce peered at him curiously, and Johnny shook his head. “It’s nothing, Bruce. Just the afterglow.”

“I know. You can’t lie for shit, Johnny. I’ve been meaning to tell you.”

“That obvious?”

“Sweatpants are killer, man,” Bruce said, and kissed him.


End file.
